14 April 1929

[probably by Agnes Conway]
 
A.E.C. and Dr Nielsen spent the day at El Medras, the “Klamm-Heiligurn["] [sic] and Al Kantara, searching for Dalman’s sanctuaries and finding nothing relating to cult.  El Medras seems to have been an open country suburb, high and cool, with an unimpeded view to Mount Hor; on this hot day it was breezy and fresh compared with Petra, with air like El Barid, and country of the same sort.  
 
The two great rooms of Nabataean inscriptions (dated by Brunnow 70 B.C. and by Dussaud 17 A.D.) were probably houses; and above the upper complex of so-called cult objects, given in Dalman I (p. 130) is a staircase leading to the S. court with houses, while over another broken down staircase leading out of this courtyard, is another terrace with houses.  There are no signs of graves, and the whole of the water complex must have served the houses, as far as I can see, as the rest of the country about is empty.  The rock 71 (Dalman I, p. 120) is covered with Dusores niches, but all the other pits seem to be part of the system for collecting water into cisterns and ornamental basins.  It looks to me like a charming arrangement of water basins in the shadow of the rock, with a triclinium in the shade where we had lunch, which might have been a place for rich Petraeans to move out to in the summer. There could be no defence.  The house fronts, where they still exist, have a door or two side windows.  The whole suburb was, I imagine, one of period and design, perhaps 70 B.C. or 17 A.D., like the inscriptions.
 
From the plateau of El-Hremije we went down the Huraimiya gorge to Dalman’s “Klamheiligturn” [sic]; which is a house of one triclinium, with the complete front preserved in unweathered red sandstone – a door between two windows, like any modern street house. It was plastered and has remains of Nabataean inscriptions, and was dark and cool, with a cistern opposite.  
 
Above it, up the gorge, is an enormous room with a Roman niche.  Probably all belonged together and may have been the summer house of a rich Petraean.  When the staircase to the Khaznah was unblocked it would not have been far to go, but as a winter house it would have been quite dark and cold.  
 
Dr Nielsen found two sanctuaries in El Kantara (Dalman’s) in which he did not believe.  
 
A curious thing is that all the rooms seen to-day were covered with Arab graffiti as well as Nabataean inscriptions. 

Why?
 
Reference: [unsigned, probably Conway, A.] 1929 (transcribed by A. Thornton). Petra Exploration Fund Diary. "Business Papers to be Kept", Horsfield Collection Box 8, UCL Institute of Archaeology, 14 April: 34-36.